Do I need to be worried about tainted or chemically sprayed cannabis? Is pot safe?
It’s getting cleaner and safer. There are a lot of things that can go wrong with a marijuana plant, and there is a lot of marijuana you would not want to ingest. Plants go bad with root rot, bud rot, mold, mildew, spider mites, thrips, aphids, white flies, caterpillars, fungus gnats, slugs, snails, and even something called the tobacco mosaic virus. In addition, people often apply horrible things to plants—sometimes to try to salvage them—like pesticides, solvents, and roach killer.
When the Oregonian famously investigated local pot being sold by medical growers last June, they found 14 chemicals in a set of randomly sampled strains, six of which the federal government classifies as having possible or probable links to cancer. The reason this is happening in Oregon and elsewhere is a combination of relaxed (or nonexistent) state rules, erratic lab practices, and unreliable test results.
Today, as early sales of marijuana are ongoing, the Oregon Health Authority is working with the Oregon Department of Agriculture to write rules for product safety. The state is also licensing testing labs and promulgating testing requirements. All of these are good ideas. The hard part for regulators is writing these rules nearly from scratch. The pot industry lacks uniform dosing, potency, and contamination standards, and it operates without the scrutiny (or benefit, depending on how you look at it) of federal regulators like the FDA and EPA.
Because people have been exposed to bad products, there will be consumer safety and product liability lawsuits for marijuana in Oregon, just as there would be with tainted tomatoes. Customers of one of Colorado’s largest pot shop chains, Livwell (which is also a massive grower), just hauled that company into federal district court on a class action lawsuit. The suit concerns Livwell’s alleged use of Eagle 20, a petroleum-based fungicide.
For a long, long time, everyone had their own way of growing marijuana and dealing with not-so-great conditions like growing indoors. Ethical growers wanted to provide a clean, wholesome product, and others just wanted to dust the mites off of plants and make money. Now, as weed becomes a regulated industry, tort claims are inevitable. We can understand those lawsuits as a sign of legitimacy. Unlike, say, heroin users, marijuana users can sign off as wronged when they consume a tainted product and they can argue that tax-paying, regulated businesses should act responsibly.
My firm always advises clients that lawsuit prevention is way, way cheaper than lawsuit defense, and better for their reputations, too. From a consumer perspective, especially before the testing rules come in, people should be asking questions about where the pot they buy is sourced, and how it is grown. The general idea is that pot should be clean and safe, like tomatoes.
In the Emerald Triangle, with the old school, white hat outlaws who supply the medical dispensaries, organic predominates.
With so many greedy, inexperienced, entrepreneurs and Mexican Cartels using strawmen as fronts to obtain licenses, all sorts of chemicals and contaminates are used deliberately and unintentionally, because they just don’t fucking give a shit.
Grow your own, or have a good contact. The store bought crap will always be inferior, commerch.
An attorney who doesn’t sue anybody is an officer of the court who isn’t making any money for his client. In fact, he’s saving money for his client’s enemy; usually a Fascist corporation in league with the judge.
Is it true that minors don’t have constitutional rights?
Children are chattel.
Is wrongful diagnosis in a non-medical state of cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome worth a lawsuit?
Cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome is only a hypothetical malady which would require a testable theory and proper scientific clinical peer reviewed studies to determine if it actually exists or not. That being said, I have a long time friend who won’t smoke Sativa, as it tends to upset his stomach. However, he enjoys smoking Hashish, without discomfort. In fact, Hash tends to ameliorate the symptoms for him. If Cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome is valid, perhaps it’s due to an anxiety reaction to stimulating effects of THC. A good Indica/Sativa hybrid, such as Northern Lights or OG Kush, might even prove to be an antidote. In any event, Cannabis in non-toxic.
A wrongful diagnosis of any medical malady must always be taken seriously. If a person over doses on heroin, which is illegal most everywhere, and the physician doesn’t catch it, than it’s definitely grounds for a lawsuit, but the worth would be relative to the damages. If the OD caused no lasting harm, then the award might be negligible; worth and negligible both being vague terms.
That being said, a small businessman I know, was pissed as Hell, because he was sued for some frivolous nonsense, but his attorney advised him to pay the ten grand and settle, because it would cost him much, much, more to fight it, and then no guarantee of outcome. So yeah, file suit and the doctor will quickly settle out of court for a small enough settlement, if for no other reason than to keep his malpractice insurance premium as low as possible. Just don’t get too greedy, but there’s no need to waste money on a shiftless shyster. Simply use Small Claims Court.
How dangerous are the bugs; mainly if their smoked?
Gee, I wonder how we managed to smoke so much and not become ill before legalization?